Yesterday, the Buffalo Bills traded safety Ko Simpson to the Detroit Lions for an undisclosed draft pick in 2010. Mark Gaughan & Allen Wilson of the Buffalo News presume it will most likely be a seventh round pick. I presume the Bills will use that pick, along with many others, on more DBs who won't amount to much either.
While the 'Million Dollar Man's' career has provided humor over the last few years, it hasn't produced much on the football field. Simpson finishes his career (for now) as a Bill with 4 pass deflections, 2 interceptions, and 1 sack over two full seasons. Unfortunately for Ko, his 2007 season was nullified by a ankle injury in week one.
Simpson was a member of the fabled 2006 draft class of the Buffalo Bills. We all remember this as Marv's first year. Levy, Brandon and Co. took Ko fourth overall and quickly moved him up the depth chart past an aging Troy Vincent.
Now, you wouldn't know this, but the Yachtsman and I have a game we like to play involving the Bills' drafts. I guess it's not so much a game as an activity. We like to go back and look at where underwhelming players the Bills have drafted, developed and cut loose were selected, then see who was picked up later in the draft.
In Ko's case, it's not the worst I've seen, but there are a few cringers. Besides the receivers not named T.O. we could've been using like disgruntled, but extremely talented, Brandon Marshall (taken just 14 picks later) and Marques Colston (as the 4th to last pick in the draft ... did I mention the 20% luck?), there are more than capable defensive backs such as seventh round pick Cortland Finnegan (17 pass deflections, 5 interceptions and 1 sack last season for the Titans) and sixth round pick Antoine Bethea (16/7/0 in 3 seasons as a Colt as long as I'm keepin' track ... Indy runs a pretty good cover 2, don't they?). Oh and did I mention both those DBs are Pro Bowlers? Well, now I have.
Keep up the good work, Bills! Let's see how much cloudier we can make the season outlook seem before the first and most important game of the season...
p.s. On a sidenote, I wanted to get my two pennies in on the firing of Turk Schonert.
Now, I never really called as vehemently for the head of Schonert as some in the past in part because I never felt he had the talent or consistency to put a cohesive offensive unit together.
From week to week last year, you didn't know which Trent would show up and whether or not anyone not named Lee would want to fight for a pass, making the passing game a moot point. And since the offensive line couldn't open a decent hole to save their season, Marshawn had to fight for every yard the second the ball hit his hands, thus making a running game nearly impossible to plan (not to mention knowing everyone plans to load 8 in the box on every play).
But it's his job to make it work with the players he's provided and he wasn't up to the task. Of course, neither is anyone else in the organization, but that's not my point.
My point is that Dick Jauron saying he hadn't decided to fire Turk until he woke up Thursday morning is officially the undisputed biggest line of shit I've been fed by this organization since the end of the Donahoe era. And if it isn't, it's the most glaring sign that Dick Jauron is unfit to be the head coach of this or any football team.
At the press conference announcing Schonert's canning, Jauron said, "I wasn't thinking about firing him three days ago. I wasn't thinking about it two weeks ago. But when you start thinking about it, I think you need to move on it and do something. When I started thinking about it I gave it a good deal of thought and did it."
Remember that week? The Bills were home against the San Francisco 49ers coming off their best offensive showing of the season. They had just snapped a four-game losing streak (THREE STRAIGHT LOSSES IN THE DIVISION and the brutal primetime Dallas-deja-vu vs. the Browns) by beating the woeful Chiefs, 54-31. Trent had completed 75% of his passes for 273 yards & 2 TDs and Marshawn pitched in 104 total yards and accounted for 2 TDs as well.
So how did Turk and his underlings ride this wave of good feelings? Right into the friggin breakwall, that's how.
The next week against San Francisco, a 3-9 team that had fired their defensive-minded head coach 6 weeks earlier, the offense managed just 3 points. In the first half, Trent completed less than 50% of his passes and was benched coming out of halftime with a 'groin injury'. And while Marshawn managed to rack up 134 yards on just 16 carries, the stats would show at the end of the day that Turk & Co. decided to throw the ball 38 times against the Niners.
[Sidenote to my sidenote: The silver lining to this dark cloud was that Rian Lindell's streak of who cares how many consecutive FGs from inside 35 or 40 or whatever the stupid stat was ended this day when he shanked a 20-yarder in the 2nd quarter.]
But before I stray too far from the point, let me say again, what the hell, Dick? In the last 5 games, we had ONE receiving touchdown! We finished the season getting SHUT-OUT AT HOME AGAINST A TEAM YOU'VE SEEN TWICE A YEAR FOR THREE YEARS...
But now was the time? Now? 10 days before the season starts, after allowing him to implement an entire new offensive scheme to a unit including an completely remodeled offensive line, you're going fire him and promote AVP?! Now, I love AVP, but his official play-calling experience is 1 season with the Frankfurt Galaxy.
I'm sorry, Dick, but if you're telling me you just woke up Thursday morning and realized your offense might need a change in leadership after finishing ranked 25th last season (edging out the likes of the Lions, Bears, Bungles and Raiders), then you are a liar, a moron or both.
Either way, cheers, I'm sure the only ones who'll wind up being embarrassed are the fans...
...sigh...